This invention relates generally to network testing, and in particular to testing connectivity of networks by automatically pinging multiple devices.
More than twenty years ago when the internet was in its infancy, standard committees were formed to ensure that devices could communicate over a network irrespective of the particular hardware used. Standards for ensuring reliable full-duplex transmission of data from one machine to another included the Transmission Control Protocol (TCP) and Internet Protocol (IP), which were merged into the TCP/IP Internet Protocol Suite, and are referred to today as simply the TCP/IP protocols. An important aspect of these protocols is the Internet Control Message Protocol (ICMP), which handles error and control messages.
Network test and diagnostic equipment employs the TCP/IP protocols in helping network managers and technicians using the equipment to identify network problems. The ICMP includes, among other things, a feature that is called an echo request-and-reply (referred to as “ping”) that is used to test whether a particular destination can be reached and will respond.
There are currently network connectivity test instruments in the market that connect to a network to verify that a network has been installed properly or that all of the devices on the network interoperate as they are intended. Such a connective test instrument is manufactured and sold by Fluke Networks, Inc. This connectivity test instrument is capable of connecting both to a desktop personal computer (PC) and to a network. Its capabilities include service identification (such as Telco, token ring, or ethernet), testing cables, generating wire maps, verifying PC and network link configurations, identifying services (servers, printers, routers, etc.), and generating problems logs to aid the user in troubleshooting network problems. It also uses the ICMP protocol discussed above to test whether a particular destination can be reached and will respond. However, it tests network connectivity by sending ICMP echo requests to one destination at a time, and waiting until responses are received and processed before sending an ICMP echo request to another destination. For verification of connectivity of several devices on a given network, the network technician or installer must laboriously ping each device one at a time, which is a time-consuming process.
It would be desirable to incorporate a feature into a network connectivity test instrument that would allow it to ping several devices upon a single ping command, with results quickly tabulated and displayed.